ALCEDOCERYLE 459- 



Frequents rivers, brooks, and ponds where the banks are 

 wooded, and at some seasons the sea-coast. It affects shad} r 

 places, perching on a branch, stump, or stone, close to or over- 

 hanging the water where it can watch for its prey, and when 

 disturbed it darts out and skims along the stream at lightning 

 speed, uttering its shrill cry, tcet, ted, tcet. It feeds on small 

 fish, which it captures by dropping into the water like a stone, 

 water-insects and crustaceans. It excavates its nest-hole in a 

 bank, or sometimes uses a rat's hole, and at the end enlarges it 

 into an oval chamber where, on the bare soil or on the fishbones 

 and castings, it lays in April, May, or June, its 5 to 7 glossy 

 white, roundish-oval eggs, which measure about 0'85 by 0'75. 



CERYLE, Boie, 1828. 



658. PIED KINGFISHER. 



CERYLE RUDIS. 



Ceryle rudis (Linn.), Syst.Nat. i. p. 181 (1766) ; Gould, B. of K ii. p. 62 ; 



Dresser, v. p. 125, pi. 291 ; Sharpe, Monogr. Alced. p. 61, pi. 19 - r 



id. Cat. B. Br. Mus. xvii. p. 109. 

 Saiad-el-semahk, Arab. 



< ad. (Asia Minor). Upper parts black, marked and varied with white ; 

 crown crested ; a white superciliary line to the hind-neck. ; tail white 

 spotted with black on the basal two-thirds, then black tipped with white ; 

 under parts white, the breast crossed by one broad and one narrow band?; 

 bill and legs black ; iris brown. Culmen 2*3, wing 5'55, tail 3'f>, tarsus 

 0'45 inch. The female differs in having only one pectoral band, and the 

 young bird resembles the female, but has the upper parts blacker, the 

 feathers on the throat with faint blackish tips, and the pectoral band is 

 greyish margined with black. 



Hob. Rare in Greece ; the Cyclades, Asia Minor, and Palestine, 

 east to the Persian Gulf; Africa south to the Cape. In India 

 and east to China it is replaced by a nearly allied species, 

 Ceryle varia, S trick 1., which has the base of the tail white, un- 

 spotted. 



It is a heavier bird than A. ispida, its flight is not very 

 swift, but direct and steadied by regular beats of the wings. 

 It frequents both inland waters and the sea-coast, and is 

 gregarious at all seasons. It breeds from April to late in May, 

 burrowing its nest-hole in a bank close to the edge of the 

 water, and the nest-cavity is a hole scooped in the side of the 

 nest tunnel. Its eggs, 4 to 6 in number, are not so polished as 

 those of A. ispida, pure white and larger, measuring about 

 115 by 1. 



